We are 无限

About Infinity

Infinity was established in 2003 in Finland. It was born out of the idea that there are no limits. ∞ Anything is possible for those who dare to dream, think differently and make things happen.

We are an award-winning Scandinavian design firm currently operating in Europe, the United States and China.

We help companies create the right connected solutions.

Our unique way of working combines hard work with accountability based on experience, positive creativity through design thinking, fresh human-centered innovation and result-oriented Lean UX.

Our clients include a variety of companies from lean startups to major global ones like Huawei, Nokia, Suunto and Jolla. Our customer projects have resulted in 65 patents worldwide.
Our work is to help our clients innovateconnected services; products and user experiences rapidly. We prefer to start our work with our clients from the very beginning of the processes – from the ideas of who are the users, to the high level concepts of what can they accomplish with the new solution, all the way to the services, devices and the user interfaces. Thus, the industrial design and user interfaces we create are results of “how it works”.

We have an exceptional experience on mobile and wearable devices and UI. A large part of our work revolves around IoT.

We apply deeply collaborative, agile and cross-functional iterative processes; Lean UX. We prototype everything immediately: the devices and the user interfaces. The processes are iterative, since we believe work should be run in rapid repeating sprints of design » prototype » test with users. Instead of just doing things right, one should focus on doing the right things: These sprints should be able to affect and even change the overall concept – if the user feedback indicates a need for that.

Innovating connected products & services

Our focus.

INTERNET OF THINGS & BIG DATA?

We innovate the devices, services & UX of the new connected world using a human-centered approach: data alone is quantitative – what data means & enables is heavily linked with human insight & Design thinking.

IoT AND BIG DATA

In the next few years, the Internet and wireless technologies will connect different sources of information such as sensors and connected devices in an ever tighter manner. The vast amount and variety of collected data enables insight that is iteratively self-learning. This will eventually affect most if not all products, services – and businesses:
Gartner expects the Internet of Things (IoT) to grow 30-fold by 2020 as connectivity becomes a standard feature, even for processors costing less than $1. Many of the new categories and businesses of connected things of 2020 don’t yet exist.
The amount and variety of data that will be gathered is huge. This opens up new possibilities.

Design thinking

Design thinking is human-centered, creative, positive problem solving with synthesis-driven approach.
It differs from analytical thinking by emphasizing divergent ideation over convergent. It is the methodology taken out of the design context and applied more widely to business and innovation processes. In design thinking observation takes a big role.
Observation often discerns what people really do as opposed to what you are told that they do.
While collecting data is a science, adding insight and inventing meaningful applications for it requires human insight – Design thinking.

HOW: MAKE & ITERATE. LEAN UX.

Less analysis and documentation – more synthesis. The world has changed. Traditional get it all figured out first approaches are not workable. We help experiment by prototyping early and iterating with the users.

THINK BIG, FAIL FAST; LEARN RAPIDLY

Focusing on the right things enables lean, rapid development delivering results as fast as possible. The goal is to create less documentation and more prototypes.
This amplifies learning during the project and enables the team to decide as late as needed to cope with the uncertainity of concept development: anything can change when the thing being designed is something completely new and not an iteration of the old.

PROTOTYPE IMMEDIATELY

We prototype everything, already at the early idea phases. We run a very rapid research sprint with the users to understand the basic assumptions – and then run rapid iterative loops of sprints: design » prototype » test with users.
The prototypes of the devices are at first very rapid handmade throw-away hacks – later typically rapid prototypes with key functionalities. The key here is to build any minimum viable thing that can be used with the users.
For digital services and user interfaces, we use real technologies on real devices, because user experiences can not be designed by screenshots. Using HTML5, we build working prototypes that run on any device and screen. They enable testing of the ideas.
Typical timeframe from kickoff to working prototypes is just 3 weeks.

GooB

Get out of the building: We start by observing the real users in their real contexts. We collaborate with them and learn from them. The prototypes can be probed and iterated with the users earlier, enabling rapid iteration of the ideas.

WORK

Another angle on wearables

: Concept Innovation · Industrial Design

SEYVR CHARGING WALLET

There’s a lot of wearable gadgets like smart watches, fitness trackers and so forth. On the other hand, smart connectivity is steadily creeping its way into clothing in a very unobtrusive manner. The SEYVR wallet is a nice simple take on it – it takes well-established paradigm and expands the functionality without hindering the existing paradigm. Charge your mobile devices on the go, without having to remember to carry extra battery packs. Clever, isn’t it!

Infinity helped Unikia right from concepting through productization up until a ramped-up product ready to sell.

“You might run out of cash, but you’ll never run out of power.”

Photos courtesy of Unikia.

Helping the elderly

: Concept Innovation · Industrial Design

MAKING SURE THE ELDERLY GET THE ATTENTION THEY NEED

The Vivago VIVA Point is base station intended for installation in people’s homes where monitoring of caretaking is required. The caretaker can easily log a care call for tracking and later reference. The person in need of care can also use the device to request for assistance.

Our Industrial Design for the VIVA Point aims for a modern yet subtle character, well suited for it’s varying installation locations. Also ease of use has been an important driver – the device only has a single push button for activating the log event.

Social TV remote control

: Concept Innovation · Industrial Design

SOCIAL TV REMOTE CONTROL

We’re proud to have worked on the ID for LiveRelay’s innovative RelayTV Social TV remote control. We started off through in-depth discussions, striving to understand the significance of the device to the end user. After having studied several concept alternatives we helped LiveRelay in managing their productization, taking care to maintain the original ID intent.

“I highly endorse Infinity for their creative design capability combining the best by way of aesthetics and function to meet our highly demanding requirements.”

Kye Cheung, CEO, LiveRelay Inc.

The RelayTV solution is designed to allow users to have fun and interact with their friends. Using the Infinity-designed remote control, viewers can further enhance their virtual living room experience with features including real time voice and text conversations, sharing viewing experiences and opinions with friends in a virtual living room and flinging virtual objects onto your friends’ TV screens.

Dog health and wellbeing depend greatly on activity, sleep and the right nutrition. Taking care of the right amount and quality of these for your dog is not easy. Every dog is an individual and their needs vary.

Beagard is a startup and they wanted to create an activity meter and an associated app as rapidly as possible.

We observed the life of dogs and the pet owners for a few days. Then we discussed with vets to understand more. Together with Beagard, we innovated ways to monitor and reward the behavior improving wellbeing. We wanted to turn all this to social, fun, rewarding – even game-like experience for the pet owners like ourselves. But most importantly – already during the second week of the project we started prototyping the UI and the device to be able to test and iterate the ideas rapidly with the users.

We strongly believe in extremely rapid prototyping as early as possible.

To test the ideas, we built HTML5 prototypes already at the idea phase during the first weeks. The prototypes enabled testing the ideas on mobile phones and tablets – together with pet owners and vets.

Simultaneously as the UI prototype iterations developed the insights of the UX, the industrial design team tested several alternative ideas how the dog could wear the activity monitor in an optimal way. Prototypes were built in record time to probe the ideas in real life. The vast variety of dog sizes and the simple everyday usage were major drivers – as was the need to design a device the pet owner can be proud of.

Product development: Designing smart home appliances

: Industrial Design · Preliminary Mechanical Design

Swegon Casa cooker hoods

New smart cooker hoods by Swegon with Industrial Design and preliminary Mechanical Design by Infinity.

Infinity was assigned to create Swegon’s new cooker hood line-up. The design language is a pilot for Swegon’s future home appliance design. Special care was taken to create a modern, unobtrusive look while optimizing the fume gathering properties and ease-of-use for the users.

Mobile phone design: the Huawei G526

: Industrial Design

(Tip: Pause the video before closing this player)

Meet the G526, our latest design for Huawei

Aimed at a mid-range price point, this design cleverly utilizes a Unibody construction, accompanied with the illusion of 3D glass.

Efficient billet heating

: Concept Innovation · Industrial Design

EFFICIENT BILLET HEATING

Effmag Ltd. has launched its revolutionary permanent magnet induction heater for the aluminum extrusion industry. Effmag induction heater has a very high 75% energy efficiency and it provides the extrusion industry with significant savings in aluminum billet heating. Unlike conventional AC-coil based induction heaters, the Effmag heater generates the alternating magnetic field by rotating permanent neodymium magnets close to the billet to be heated.

Infinity’s aim was to provide a safe and approachable work environment for the operator. Usability has been improved in a clever way through the use of integrated status indicator lights, instead of traditional, bulky “traffic lights”. Also the ergonomics and easy access for maintenance operations have been carefully designed. All the components of the heater are enclosed within a single housing, on a comfortable height for service.

Effmag develops and markets permanent magnet induction heaters for aluminum extrusion lines. The heaters are used to preheat the aluminum billets before the billets enter the extrusion press. With 75% energy efficiency the Effmag heater offers substantial energy savings for energy intensive industry over prevailing methods. Read more about Effmag heating technology at www.effmag.com.

Rugged biometric enrollment

: Concept innovation · Industrial Design

RUGGED BIOMETRIC ENROLLMENT

The T1 is a fully ruggedized handheld biometric peripheral that captures face, finger, iris, contact card and other modalities at or above full biometric enrollment standards. It’s designed to pair seamlessly with off-the-shelf communications devices running any operating system, or to operate standalone.

The T1 is a good example of Infinity’s Industrial Design for vertical solutions. It’s an interesting design because it establishes a new category and a usage pattern, so the focus of the ID shifts toward managing the semantics of the product. The purpose of the device needs to be as apparent as possible. Given the multiple functionalities of the product, it’s a careful balance between being informative about all the things the T1 can do and tying them all together into a coherent package.

Infinity worked together with Talon ID‘s US-based engineering partner to meet all ruggedization criteria. “The T1 is designed to work in extreme environments, taking on the elements while the off-the-shelf communications device is tucked safely away. With full immersion protection, twice the operating temperature range of other devices, extended life batteries, and substantial drop protection, the T1 is truly PlanetProof™“, says Jeff Schott, CEO at Talon ID.

“Infinity was able to come up with a design that exceeded our expectations on all fronts; the design is iconic, intuitive, and unlike anything else in the industry.”

Jeff Schott, CEO, Talon ID, Inc.

“We presented Infinity with a complex set of requirements. The T1’s form factor is very similar to that of a cell phone, but we did not want the device to be perceived as one. We wanted the T1’s PlanetProof™ toughness to be self-evident in the design, without the traditional rubber bumps and grips used to designate ruggedization. And the T1 has multiple use cases, some of which require the design to be used in different orientations; we challenged Infinity to find a way to lead the user to optimal ergonomics, without conflicting dynamics between the various use cases. Infinity was able to come up with a design that exceeded our expectations on all fronts; the design is iconic, intuitive, and unlike anything else in the industry” says Jeff Schott.

Mobile phone design: Jolla

: Concept innovation · Industrial Design

A startup like no other

The Inﬁnity team is very passionate and committed, and they always strive to achieve the best possible results. Jolla works in a similar way.Our contacts at Inﬁnity always know exactly what is going on in our projects. We are extremely happy with the co-operation.

Martin Schüle, Chief Designer at Jolla Ltd.

2-Marine Beacon

: Concept innovation · Industrial Design

RELIEVING DISTRESS OFFSHORE

Developed for offshore professionals, the 2-Marine distress beacon serves two purposes. First, it helps relive cognitive stress under harsh working conditions as the workers are aware they have a security device with them. Second, in case of a man-overboard situation, the radio frequency signal combined with the flashing light help the rescue teams to locate men in open water.

To activate the beacon, simply yank on it and hold for a short while. The beacon floats upright so workers won’t have to worry about the operation of the device.

UX AT WORKPLACE: CONSUMERIZATION OF USABILITY EXPECTATIONS

: LEAN UX DESIGN · HTML5 PROTOTYPING

Teleste is an international technology group specialized in broadband video and data communication systems and services.

Teleste Luminato device was designed by us earlier, and we designed their HTML5-based user interface for remote management of the device.

Luminato is a headend platform for cable TV operators. It is a high density modular platform for Cable TV and IPTV headends, with a small footprint in 1RU chassis, low power consumption and advanced DVB stream processing

“Professional equipment with parallel usability of the best consumer devices.”Teleste

It is mature and most comprehensive headend platform with installed base of thousands of active devices. It is trusted by cable TV operators and Telco’s of varying sizes and feature demands. One thing is common though; they all appreciate its unparallel reliability and ease of use.

UI INNOVATION + PROTOTYPING

We studied the users in the real contexts to find out what the actual needs and their priorities for the user interface were. Along laptops, tablets were extensively used in the server rooms. We also found out several key configuring tasks and monitoring needs that needed to be prioritized in the UI.

In record speed of 3 weeks, we built functional HTML5 prototypes to demonstrate the concepts we innovated for the UI together with the Teleste team. The prototypes served as a great tool for decision making, user testing and sales. They were used to probe end customer interest at fairs. To see is to believe, and the customer feedback enabled the project to go rapidly to implementation phase.

The app was iterated through prototypes to maximize usability. In just months from the kick-off, the final product was shipped to the end customers, taking Teleste to lead in terms of usability of the remote user interfaces, too. It has drag-and-drop configuring and visual, active monitoring views ensuring consumer UI-like user experience.

BETTER FIREPLACES

: Concept Innovation · Industrial Design

BETTER FIREPLACES

Tulikivi manufactures home and sauna heater units. The most important challenge we’ve helped them with is to the translate the heritage of their field of business into something that corresponds to the evolved needs of end users today. Heater units are no longer just for heating, but an integral part of the home experience in form of function and decor.

Our work has concentrated on making heater units with improved lifecycle and positioning that matches today’s demand, all in an efficient and ecological way. We’ve sought after solutions that would integrate into one’s home as opposed to “stand-alone” design objects. This has also become a crucial differentiation factor for Tulikivi. We’ve contributed to guiding business development efforts through product positioning and portfolio planning, all the while taking care of product development support and supplier matchmaking.

In all heater unit applications, our approach has been efficiency through modularity. In most cases, there’s a single package of expandable package of hardware that goes into a range of products. Different positioning is achieved through different lining options, many of which utilize materials, constructions and technologies new to heater units. Also, conventional analogue controls have been updated to touch screen or top of the line remote-controllable home automation applications depending on product positioning.

Specialized Devices

SPECIALIZED DEVICES

In vertical solutions, is is possible to gain an unfair advantage through design driven innovation. We’ve always felt it’s a very interesting challenge to incorporate a human-centered approach to specialized devices.

Industrial design is often perceived as a “layer of good looks” on top of product engineering. Our approach is quite the contrary, we believe the best results will be achieved in the intersection of the needs of the end user and engineering. The story of a product should stem from making technology approachable to the human in the other end. The aesthetics will resolve itself through means of materials and construction.

We’ve worked in close co-operation with Elektrobit (EB) for several years, mostly for the U.S. and European and markets. Elektrobit is a provider of specialized embedded software and hardware solutions for the automotive and wireless industries.

Highlights of our co-operation

Android based Specialized Device Platform, an EB reference design targeted to vertical markets such as Public Safety, Security and Defense. This is the first device in a series of products that showcase an example implementation of EB’s HW platform.

The preferred ID partner for our US based vertical device programs. The team consistently creates compelling designs that are enthusiastically accepted by our customers.

”Craig

In these projects, we’ve contributed not only to industrial design but to prototype engineering and mechanical parts sourcing and integration as well. The devices have been enthusiastically received by EB’s customers and have helped EB to gain significant business traction. These devices are a useful business development tool, and up to date, three generations of reference designs have come to life and there’s more to come.

Industrial Design and mechanical engineering for several of EB’s Client programs. Our contribution has ranged from focusing the requirements of products, through ID concepting and development to program-time ID support up to ramp-up, all in close co-operation with EB’s product development teams.

AWARDS

5 x red dot product design awards and 5 x iF product design awards

Some highlights:

Excel Xtel System™ for high reach window cleaning, awarded red dot best of the best in 2008.

DESIGNING EASY-TO-USE INSTRUMENTS

Airmodus nano-particle counters

Applications of nano-particle counters include climate research and air quality monitoring. Single nano-sized particles can not be observed optically. Therefore particles must be grown to optical sizes.

Airmodus offers next generation nanoparticle counters for scientific and industrial use. Together, we wanted to create a minimalistic, professional industrial design and user interface for the new Airmodus A20. It can be used as stand-alone instrument for measuring particle number concentration in air, or as counter in different kinds of aerosol measurement systems.

We created a range of concepts aiming at simple usability of the UI – plus a look and feel matching the high quality of the precision instrument. The main goal was to ensure that the device will be easy to use and handle.

The final product design of Airmodus A20 is well suited for atmospheric measurement, laboratory studies, air quality monitoring and industrial applications. High scientific standards together with smart design make the instrument a delight to use.

Replace newspaper

: Concept innovation · Industrial Design

IS IT POSSIBLE TO REPLACE NEWSPAPER?

Automatically updating newspaper on an e-reader 3.8mm thin, given to you for free. Sound amazing? This is what we’re working with. The operation aims to develop a new information sharing channel that combines the e-paper and digital TV data transfer technologies. Along with us, the Finnish partner companies are Bluegiga Technologies, Cubio, DNA, Etnoteam, Sanoma and Yoka Consulting.

Both content management and its distribution are changing drastically. At the same time, the meaning of locality is growing all the time.

Janne Kaijärvi, Editor-in-chief, Sanoma Kaupunkilehdet

What we tried to achieve is a focused, as straightforward as possible a product that would do only one thing, and do that extremely well. E-paper has very good visual ergonomics and the paper-thin enclosure makes the interaction reminiscent of reading an actual paper. Convenience has been maximized: The device always displays the latest newspaper content. There is no blank screen waiting for interactions to enable reading, content updates automatically without interaction, there are no menus. All this enables a much more smooth user experience than on tablets.

The functionality of the e-reader device is limited to only receiving information so that it can be made very thin, low-powered and low-cost to produce.

The e-reader has a 9.7-inch e-paper display and the thickness of the whole device is only 3.8 millimeters. The e-reader works for weeks with one charge. In the future, it will use solar energy in which case the device is completely independent from electric network. The electronic local newspaper is updated to the e-readers via digital TV signal during the small hours and automatically during the day if needed. The aim is that the new device could be delivered to every household for free.

HEADSETS INSIDE

: Concept Innovation · Industrial Design

HEADSETS INSIDE

Tablets are used for voice and video calls. Playing games, listening to music and videos in public requires Bluetooth headsets. They are easily lost, require pairing and charging.

We felt it is possible to innovate something better – new concepts that avoid the hassle and maximize the usability.

Infinity works with IHF, an innovative startup with patents for integrating headsets in mobile devices. Infinity developed the headset ideas further for mobile phones and tablets.

Innovating new shapes for headsets tiny enough to fit inside mobile phones and tablets, Infinity created prototypes to test ergonomics with. The Windows tablets were developed for consumer markets, with a unique maximized display area covering the whole front side. The Android tablet versions were aimed at vertical markets.

The integrated headsets enable professionals to use tablets for voice and special apps at the same time. For consumers, they offer privacy for entertainment and communication. Integration enables very small headsets as they are charged while docked. They are carried in the device and do not get lost. There is no need for pairing.

CONNECTED GOLF

: Concept Innovation · Industrial Design · Mechanical Design

CONNECTED GOLF

Driven by a passion for golf and innovative technology, GameBook® was founded by two golf professionals and enthusiasts to find a solution to a challenge: is it possible to increase players’ excitement throughout a golf event in new ways.

Their dream was to create a real-time event scoring system to help players feel more connected with each other and the game. Our task was to invent the right concepts that would make the vision tangible for the everyday player and to meet the rigorous demands of golf professionals – pulling valuable input together into an easy-to-use, environmentally sealed device.

We made a range of ID concepts, including 12-device charger stands that would enable group events hosted by golf clubs. In GameBook’s direction, one of the concepts was chosen and refined to precisely meet the requirements at hand. The concept was then transformed into a real product by our Mechanical Designers in a turnkey fashion; the client receiving a solution that was ready for production.

The GameBook scoring device is a successful vertical solution enabling golf players to enjoy a more exciting, immersive game experience. Enthusiastically received by top players and golf clubs, the GameBook is a truly captivating and revolutionary device.